


Karaage

by Steangine



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-10
Updated: 2015-09-10
Packaged: 2018-04-20 01:45:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,744
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4768925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Steangine/pseuds/Steangine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sakurai often prepares lunch for Aomine. Kuroko can't cook anything except for boiled eggs but he has a Kagami-kun up his sleeve. [After series. AoKuro pre-slash. Kuroko likes Aomine but didn't confess yet. Aomine likes Kuroko but isn't aware of his feelings yet. Let the dorks be dorks.]</p>
            </blockquote>





	Karaage

**Author's Note:**

> Karaage is a Japanese technique of cooking and it's basically fried food. I chose this because you can write Karaage with the kanji of sky and raise. And because I love fried things. Even a wheel is tasty when fried.  
> The main idea is that everyone is friend now and when it's a nice day and they don't have school they go outside and play basketball together.

The first Sunday of summer welcomed a cozy warmth, but, for how Kuroko’s eyes were turned towards the sky, the blurry greyish clouds didn’t look to be moved enough to show a glimmer of sun.  
He was sitting on the court, his back leaning onto the net and Nigou quietly sleeping in between his legs. Every voice reached his ears and Kuroko, even if was observing the landscape, could perfectly imagine what was happening.

“The ball was mine!”

Probably Kise was whining without anyone who cared about him.

“Kagami don’t get in my way!”

“You don’t have to get in my way!”

Even if Kuroko didn’t know him well, he pictured in his mind Sakurai bowing at Aomine and Kagami with the usual and useless tantrum.

“I’m sorry! I’m sorry!”

And when Kasamatsu and Momoi lectured at the same time respectively Kise and Aomine, Kuroko lowered his head. His view was so bright clear that what he saw for some seconds were indistinct figures moving in front of him. Then he focused on a hand handling a bottle and turned towards Takao.

“Thank you.”

Kuroko took the bottle and Takao sat down almost laying on the ground. His skin was all covered in sweat and the face was so red Kuroko was afraid he could collapse.

“Midorima-kun won at scissor, paper, rock again.” It wasn’t a question.

“It appears Cancer’s luck is ranked first today.” Takao breathed out. “Are they quarreling again?!”

“Yes.”

Takao gave Kuroko a hopeless look.

“You don’t look very surprised.” He didn’t look very anything, but Takao shut up on that.

“I’m used to it.”

As Midorima added his voice to the lively discussion on the court, Kuroko felt a glimpse of nostalgia and wondered what Akashi and Murasakibara were doing in that moment. At the same time Sakurai stumbled towards them, still trembling when he took out two lunch boxes.

“Oh, you eat that much?” Takao was surprised.

Sakurai jolted and looked at both with suspicious fear. “Oh no. One is for me but the other is for Aomine-san.”

Kuroko frowned. _“…san?”_

“Why do you cook the lunch for Aomine-kun?”

“Because he always steals mine.” He explained with wobbling voice. “So I make two. Especially when we have games after lessons even if there’s no much time for me to prepare it. I’m so sorry!”

Takao tilted his head. “…okay?” He whispered at Kuroko. “I still can’t understand him.”

Aomine’s wild arrival cut out Kuroko’s reply. He almost fell on Sakurai but deftly took place next him and grasped one of the black boxes.

“Ah, I’m starving!”

“Aomine-kun.” Kuroko grasped his attention. “It looks like you are pillaging his food.”

“Heh? Tetsu, what the hell? I’m not pillaging here!”

“Threatening?”

“Neither!”

Takao followed their talk with an amused smile until Kise and Momoi pushed him away sitting on Kuroko’s sides. To his surprise it was Kagami who asked if everything was okay, right before Midorima did.

Kuroko ate his lunch among Nigou’s cute chews and Kise and Momoi’s chatting.

“What do you think, Momocchi?”

“That’s nice, Ki-chan! What do you think, Tetsu-kun?”

“Yes, nice.”

Kuroko replied distractedly -he stopped listening a bunch of questions before- while eyeing Aomine’s voracious hunger as he was devouring Sakurai’s lunch. Before Aomine attacked the food with the chopsticks, Kuroko had managed to take a quick look and had to admit the lunch had a cute shape. He didn’t know karaage and vegetables could be used so well to make such a beautiful and colored drawing. Sakurai was a good cook considering how Aomine was enjoying his meal.

“Kagami-kun.”

Kagami almost choked himself with the rice, not sure if it was because of Kuroko’s sudden appearance or because Nigou was happily panting on his knee.

“W-what?”

He barely managed to speak while Takao, behind him, was almost dying of laughter and spitting all the food in his mouth over an angered Midorima.

“I have a favor to ask you.”

 

 

Kagami was tired. After a day spent playing basketball -plus yelling at Aomine\- all he wanted was to sink onto his sofa and watching tv until he was sleepy enough to go straight to bed.

But Kuroko was standing in front of him, wearing an apron so long it resembled more a dress from a front view, and Kagami felt like he had been tricked.

“Thank you, Kagami-kun.”

“Tomorrow we have a match too, you know?”

“I didn’t think their match would be tomorrow. Momoi-san told me at the last moment.”

That was his excuse and Kagami experienced more than once that Kuroko’s plain face was more convincing than any other trick he could have used. The sense of unease he felt brought him up to the decision of teaching him how to cook.

“At least we play in the same place.” He sighed. “What do you want to–“

“Karaage chicken.”

Kuroko prevented him and put on the table a bag with the ingredients – okay, Kagami had to admit he didn’t notice that bag when Kuroko appeared at his door.

“But Karaage will turn like stone by tomorrow.”

“I’ll wake up early and make another one.”

Kagami stared at Kuroko while trying to elaborate all the information. He didn’t know if it was possible but was almost certain his brain has been hurting continuously since when he first met Kuroko and one by one all the other players from Teikou.  
One month after the end of the Winter Cup, in the exact morning of his birthday, Kuroko confessed to him he liked Aomine more than a friend. Kagami had almost erased the information until Kuroko pleaded to teach him how to cook a decent lunch.  
Kagami had never prepared a lunch for school in his life so he didn’t have a perfect idea of what he should have prepared; however, somewhere deep inside him, he knew he would have felt guilty if he were to leave Kuroko under the guidance of a cooking book. Not because he didn’t believe in his cooking skills -no one could have been worse than Riko and Momoi at cooking- but because somehow Kagami thought that Kuroko cared about that lunch more than the upcoming match. Meaning it was very important to him.

“…okay. What do you want to put on the box with the chicken?”

Kuroko instantly took out a box of eggs. “Tamagoyaki.” A package of shrimps with and a bag of vegetables. “Tempura.” And went on grasping salt, pepper and all the other ingredients. “Then I would like to add an American sweet.”

Kagami looked at the table full of ingredients. “Are you caring about his liver?”

“Aomine-kun’s liver is as strong as yours.” His reply was firm,

“Alright, alright.” Kagami sensed it was useless to argue in that moment. A strange light was sparkling in Kuroko’s eyes. “First of all, let’s wash our hands. Then we’ll start by cutting the chicken in pieces.”

An entire chicken. Kagami was frightened by the way Kuroko was holding the knife.

“Kuroko, cutting a chicken is quite har–“

The blade cut the air with a sharp sound: in one move Kuroko had split the chicken in two parts. Kagami carefully made a mental recap of what words he should leave outside from his explanation in order to keep Kuroko as calm as possible.

“Good job.” He said slowly. “Now cut it in small pieces and debone them.”

The more the job got difficult, the calmer Kuroko turned and this was a relief for Kagami. Until Kuroko made a small moan and hid a finger inside his hand.

“Hey, what happened?”

Kuroko slowly opened his hand. There was a small cut on the fingertip of his left index, nothing that a plaster couldn’t solve, but Kagami’s eyes dazed more than before towards Kuroko until they finished to prepare the chicken.

“We must prepare the mix and put in there the chicken for at least 30 minutes. 1 hour is better though. Meanwhile we’ll prepare the other things.”

Kagami took a bowl and noticed Kuroko was staring at him.

“What’s wrong?”

“Kagami-kun, you are unexpectedly good at explaining. If you studied more you would be a good student.”

“Hey! We are not talking about school here!”

For how Kagami insisted, Kuroko wanted to prepare the mix by himself and he managed to scratch his wrist before he finished it.  
While Kuroko was washing the vegetables, Kagami wondered if a single box of plaster was enough for him.

“Maybe you should just roast the vegetables and the shrimps. If fried, they’re not so good when they turn cold.”

“But Aomine-kun likes them more this way.”

“If they’re cold probably he won’t enjoy them.” Kagami sounded so convincing that Kuroko didn’t reply and waited for a solution. “You can roast them and prepare a side sauce so the taste will be enhanced. You are already making the chicken so it’s fine like that. Moreover there’s the tamagoyaki. And it’s better to forget the dessert for now.”

Kuroko was hanging off his words and Kagami felt unease as it was the first time he saw him in that state.

“Alright.” Kuroko agreed. “Please, show me how to prepare all these things.”

With a deep bow, Kuroko entrusted his bento into Kagami’s hands.

 

 

Kuroko had his hands almost covered in plasters, dark circles around his eyes and his hairs resembled a bush more than the usual. However, despite that unusual and creepy feature, Kagami managed to ignore him until the teacher called his name and he replied. The scary thing wasn’t his sudden appearance but his gloomy aspect.

“K-Kuroko?”

“Good morning, Kagami-kun.”

“Kuroko, when did you wake up?”

“3 am. But it was worth it.” Kuroko opened a bag and showed three black boxes of lacquered wood. “In the end I made more food than necessary. But Aomine-kun eats a lot.” He gave a weak smile. “I also added white rice, octopus shaped wieners and boiled eggs. I added eyes to the eggs.” He pointed out with a burst of pride weakened by his weary state of body and mind.

Kagami was afraid Kuroko was about to collapse and his fears became truth when he fainted next to him during the morning break.

After a two hours sleep in the infirmary Kuroko gained again a bit of color on his cheeks and hid his lack of sleep behind his plain expression – but for the plasters there was nothing to do and Riko did the Boston Crab on him.

“Kuroko, are you okay?”

“Yes.”

Kuroko seemed on the verge of vomiting. Riko, before leaving school, forced him to gulp down more food than what he was used to eat and that, added to his crescent anxiety, was making him trembling in a weird way.

“I’m going.”

“But are you okay?”

“I’m going.”

“Hey Kuroko.”

“I’m going.”

“…how old are you?”

“I’m going.”

Furihata , sitting near them, noticed the situation.

“Kuroko, are you okay?”

Kuroko stood up with no prediction, scaring both of them, while all the other teammates were chatting without noticing him.

“I’m going.”

He repeated and this time he stiffly marched towards the door.

“W-wait. Kuroko, the lunch!”

Kuroko walked back pacing like a goofy military and disappeared behind the door of the lockers.

“…what’s happening?” Furihata looked worried.

“I guess puberty.”

“Heh?!”

Despite his weird way of moving, nobody noticed Kuroko as he paced down the corridors towards the room where Touou was preparing for the match. He recognized the door before reading the name on the label next to it because of Wakamatsu’s scream against Aomine about not stealing food from Sakurai. That particular situation gave Kuroko enough strength to be determined of opening the door and giving Aomine the lunch.

But Aomine opened the door and he looked as surprised as him when he realized Kuroko was there.

“I got it! Don’t yell I’m just going to take a drin–Tetsu?”

Kuroko felt like he only wanted to run back.

“Hi, Aomine-kun.” He managed to control his voice. “When is your match due?”

“Mpf, in two hours. We’ll watch another match before.”

“Ours?”

“No. Senshinkan’s. It looks like their rookies are quite good and the coach wants us to keep an eye on them.” He yawned. “Satsuki told me this morning Seirin also has a match here. Against which school?”

“Jousei High.”

“Mh.” Aomine eyed the boxes. “What’s up with those lunch boxes? Do you still have to eat?”

The conversation was going too fast for Kuroko’s brain to keep the pace with it and he didn’t reply fast enough.

“Man, I ate everything Sakurai prepared to me and I think my stomach is going to burst.”

Kuroko’s hopes crushed in tiny fragments but what he felt inside his stomach was the heavy weight of the lunch he didn’t digested well.

“I prepared this for... the team.” He said with a listless voice. “Now I need to go to my lockers. Good luck for your match.”

“Uh, okay but– Tetsu, hey!” Aomine tried to stop him but around the corner Kuroko managed to disappear. “That little… I wonder if his hands are okay…”

 

 

In a week time Kuroko’s cuts were disappearing but he still had some plasters and, for his own sake, he promised Riko that weekend he would have taken a break from playing basketball. In order to prevent him from doing stupid things she followed him and Kagami to the court they used to play with the others during their free time, so Kuroko had to spend the morning watching his friends playing.

“Surely your coach is mad.”

Aomine reached him at the end of the game, escaping from a talk between Midorima and Murasakibara. Riko was talking with Akashi and Momoi was carefully listening to them.

“Because she hit you and Kagami when you didn’t stop arguing?”

“My head still hurts!”

Nigou had approached Aomine as he arrived near and was leaping around him waiting for his attentions. Aomine sat down and made him sit on his lap before taking a long sip of water.

“Hey Tetsu, how are your hands?”

“Fine.”

“Cooking isn’t your best skill huh?” Aomine’s comment pierced Kuroko’s pride. “But I guess it’s better than Satsuki’s.”

Kuroko liked Momoi, however he had to agree internally with Aomine – even if, when he discovered how he got hurt, he laughed at him, and Kuroko wasn’t really sure he had already passed over that.

Nigou sniffed eagerly the air around him and slowly walked towards Kuroko’s bag. He put his head in it but Kuroko was fast enough to take him back.

“What happens?”

“I think he is hungry.”

Kuroko took out two black lunch boxes and rustled looking for Nigou’s food. The dog tried to inspect them when Aomine took him again and he made a disappointed growl.

“Two? Since when do you eat that much?”

“One is for Momoi-san.”

Aomine’s jaw almost dropped but he controlled himself. “What?”

“Since when she learnt I prepared a lunch once she asked me if she could taste it. So I caught the chance and made it for today.”

“I see...”

As Kuroko put the food inside the bowl, Nigou wiggled out of Aomine’s arms and threw himself towards the bowl with such a rush that he almost ended up inside it. The bowl was so big all his head disappeared inside and Aomine only heard the noises of his frenzy eating.

“Nigou, don’t eat so fast.” Kuroko dearly admonished him.

“Hey, Tetsu.”

“Yes?”

“That lunch box… do you eat it all? I mean, you’ve never been a big eater and judging from your body this didn’t change.”

Kuroko felt a burst of irritation. “Probably. I didn’t put much in it.” He lied.

“Oh, okay.”

Aomine , without much interest, looked at Momoi who was walking towards them. Kuroko caressed Nigou’s head as the dog was licking his mouth, sign that he was appreciating his meal, then inspected carefully Aomine’s face and noticed how he was trying to avoid looking directly in his direction.

“But… if you want you can taste a bit of mi–“

“Yes!” Aomine turned so fast that his neck hurt and he made a dumb expression of pain. “Yes, I’d like to taste it!”

“Alright. But just a taste.”

“Only one.”

Taste by taste, Kuroko ended up relying on Sakurai to be able to eat something. However he was happy like that.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope Kagami sounded like Kagami. I wanted it to be more shoujo but it wasn't so much shoujo. I like to think that Aomine, after this, starts asking Kuroko if he can prepare his lunch when they meet with the others to play basketball.


End file.
